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About SBL

The Society of Biblical Literature is the oldest and largest international scholarly membership organization in the field of biblical studies. Founded in 1880, the Society has grown to over 8,500 international members including teachers, students, religious leaders and individuals from all walks of life who share a mutual interest in the critical investigation of the Bible.

Events

A Calendar of Events for Biblical and Religious StudiesSubmit your events via email to Sharon Johnson. Minor editorial revisions may be made for stylistic purposes and for reasons of length. Submissions must include a link for more information - either a website or an email link. We cannot host PDF documents.

March 2015

3/26–3/27

Integrating Judaism and Christianity into the Study of the Ancient World The Center for Ancient Studies announces the
Ranieri Colloquium on Ancient Studies: Integrating Judaism and Christianity into the Study of the Ancient World.
Keynote address:
The New Testament as a Source for the History of the Jews and Judaism will be delivered by Lawrence H. Schiffman, NYUMore information

Deadline- Call for Proposals
The University of Southern California's West Semitic Research Project (http://www.usc.edu/dept/LAS/wsrp) has finished training the fourth round of applicants for training in Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) and is looking for another round of applicants.
For more information, seethe training program pdf or the projects information page or contact Marilyn Lundberg (mlundber@usc.edu) or Bruce Zuckerman (bzuckerm@usc.edu).

4/1

CFP Deadline- Atheism, Scepticism, and Challenges to Monotheism
The BAJS Conference 2015 will be held 5-7 July 2015 at the The University of Manchester, UK.
This conference is hosted by the British Association for Jewish Studies, in cooperation with the Centre for Jewish Studies and the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures at the University of Manchester, and with the Institut für Jüdische Philosophie und Religion, Universität Hamburg.

Jews from across a wide spectrum of perspectives have wrestled with the questions posed by atheism and scepticism down through the centuries. Since, arguably, atheism is not recognised in the Hebrew Bible, the related theme of ‘challenges to Jewish monotheism’ is suggested with regard to the ancient world. Philosophical scepticism and atheism (in both theory and practice) raise questions for Jews about the nature of authority, modes of enquiry and textual analysis, intellectual exchange with non-Jewish culture (including polemics), and shifting conceptions of heresy, nonconformity, and irreligion. What is the relationship in the Jewish imagination between atheism and scepticism? What are the limits of scepticism in rabbinic thought and methodology? What does it mean to be an atheistic Jew? How have Jews engaged with historical-critical and scientific discourse? There have been many different Jewish responses to such questions, ranging from stout defences of monotheistic Judaism, to radical reformulations of Jewish religion, to theological resignation and apostasy, to the establishment of alternative universalist systems of thought by ostensibly non-Jewish Jews. These responses, which include the varieties of Jewish religion but also non-religious ways of being Jewish, appear in many different forms including philosophical, theological, sociological, psychological, legal, mystical, and literary genres.

We welcome contributions from all periods and regions, whether narrowly focused or broadly contextual, synthetic or analytical. The intention of this interdisciplinary conference is to encourage contributions on any issues relating to the engagement of Jews with atheistic and sceptical worldviews for the purpose of understanding Jewish culture and history. The conference will provide a forum for the exploration of these questions both from within Jewish Studies but also from contributors who have not previously been involved in BAJS. The expectation is that the conference will result in an edited collection of essays on this theme.

As ever, the annual conference is likely to include papers that fall outside of the conference theme, and we encourage colleagues to submit abstract proposals for such papers.

Ministerium Sermonis’: International Conference on North African Patristic Sermons
On 8-10 April 2015 the research units History of Church and Theology and Literary Studies: Latin Literature
of the University of Leuven will organize, in collaboration with the Augustinian Historical Institute of
Malta, an International Conference on North African Patristic Sermons.
This conference, which will be
supported by the Scientific Committee of the Series Latina of the Corpus Christianorum (Brepols Publishers)
and the review Augustiniana (Heverlee/Leuven), will bring together scholars who have recently made important
contributions to the study of patristic homiletics.

The conference will take place in Malta, at the Augustinian Historical Institute. It is meant as a sequel to
the conferences organised in Leuven/Turnhout (30-31 May 2008) and Rome (15-17 September 2011) entitled
‘Ministerium sermonis’, the proceedings of which have been published in Instrumenta Patristica et Mediaevalia
53 and 65 (Brepols, Turnhout 2009 and 2012). While the previous two conferences focussed on Augustine’s
preaching, the 2015 conference will be dedicated to the broader field of patristic sermons in Latin North
Africa.
If you would like to deliver a lecture during this conference, please send the provisional title, abstract (max. 500 words) and a concise CV (max. 500 words) before 1 June 2014, to:Shari.Boodts@arts.kuleuven.be

4/10-4/11

Religious Studies, Liberal Arts and the Public University Conference
The conference will be held at Texas State University and is sponsored by the College of Liberal Arts, the Department of Philosophy, and the NEH Distinguished Teaching Professor in Humanities.

The conference will examine religious studies methods, curriculum, pedagogy, and ethos in terms of the field’s relationship to two key social locations, the liberal arts, and the public university. Proposals are invited for papers and presentations on this theme. The organizers are particularly interested in the following topics: the intersection or disjunction of religious studies methods with the fields of humanities and social sciences; what religious studies contributes to liberal education; disciplinary ethos in the context of public universities bound by the First Amendment; the public university as fertile context for religious studies as an analytical discipline; history of religious studies at public universities; curricular and pedagogical challenges of religious studies in both liberal arts and public university contexts; the departmental model and its alternatives, especially the presence of religious studies as part of multidisciplinary departments; the articulation of the value of religious studies in an age of austerity; and particular challenges for religious studies in online or hybrid pedagogy. Proposals falling under the conference title but not specifically listed here will also be considered.

Please send proposals (250 word maximum) by email attachment to Dr. Rebecca Raphael, Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy, via email at rr23@txstate.edu by January 20, 2015. Any questions should be directed to Dr. Raphael via email or at (512) 245-1393.

4/16-4/17

Muted Voices: Neglected Texts and Early Christian Identities
Durham University, England. A two-day conference on neglected epistolary texts and early Christian identities. These texts include (but are not limited to) James, Hebrews, 1-2 Peter, as well as the non-canonical texts of Epistle of Barnabas and 1 Clement (among others). In an era where a Pauline- or Gospel-centered reading is often the starting point for ‘the’ normative/orthodox reading, this gathering hopes to privilege these ‘muted’ texts to explore Christian identities from another perspective. The conference will take a multi-faceted approach, investigating identities via a number of avenues: theological, anthropological, sociological, reception historical, and political readings. Our world-class invited speakers will facilitate this discussion through plenary addresses, and we encourage you to contribute by submitting your abstract of no more than 200 words to mutedvoices2015@gmail.com by 18th January 2015.

Power, Authority, and Canon New College, University of
Edinburgh, Scotland.
The
process by which some authoritative scriptures came to be included in the
canons of Judaism and Christianity has received much attention. While light has
been shed on the importance of scribalism, citation, rewriting, and community
understanding, little attention has been placed on the implications in making
some scriptures, and not others, authoritative.
The scope of this conference will revolve around the issues of historical,
theological and ethical ramifications of canonization. What are the effects in
elevating certain writings to the status of “Holy Scriptures”? Some texts have
the power to define identity and orthodoxy, to inspire noble actions, and also
to justify violence and prejudice. Is the belief in the holiness of certain
texts a warrant for their use and misuse?
For further information and to register.

5/7-5/9

East-West Theological Forum
The 4th conference of the East-West Theological Forum will be held on 7-9 May 2015 at Sogang University, Seoul, Korea.
The 2015 conference has been called for on the theme: "Crisis and Hope: The Church in a Changing World". We cordially invite you to our coming conference and to submit papers for EWTF Prize (10,000 US$) or proposals for parallel session. More information

5/21-5/23

Sacra privata. From pagan religiosity to early Christian domestic cult
University of Vienna, Austria
The three-day international conference brings together scholars from different scientific fields comprising New Testament Studies, Christian Archaeology, Ancient History of Religion and Church History. By analyzing archaeological and literary sources the lectures will discuss the phenomenon of domestic religion from various perspectives reaching from the Egyptian, Hellenistic and Roman time to early Christianity.Speakers are Edward Adams, Christoph Auffarth, Andreas Bendlin, Sible De Blaauw, John Bodel, David Frankfurter, Marco Frenschkowski, Verena Fugger, Katharina Greschat, Caroline Johnson-Hodge, Judith Lieu, Margaret Y. MacDonald, Andrew McGowan, Andreas Müller, Andreas Pülz, Günther Schörner, Ulrich Volp, Norbert Zimmermann; organized by Markus Öhler and Norbert Zimmermann For registration, accommodation and further information concerning the conference please see http://domesticreligion.univie.ac.at

5/21- 5/24

Holiness: On the Holy, the Holy One, Sanctification and Saints:
The Bi-annual Meeting of the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality
Saint Augustine College, Johannesburg, South Africa. Announcing its second biannual conference, the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality (SSCS), in collaboration with the Spirituality Association of South Africa (SPIRASA), warmly welcomes researchers on Spirituality to a meeting at the campus of St. Augustine College in Johannesburg, South Africa. Submissions on any topic of current interest within the field of Spirituality are invited. Particularly welcome are proposals for papers, panels and workshops on topics related to the specific theme of holiness.Titles and abstracts for proposals for papers, panels, sessions and workshops are awaited until 15 December 2014
Proposals for papers should include contact information of the proposer/s, a title and an abstract of not more than 150 words, sent to spirasa@gmail.com.
Proposals for panels, sessions and workshops should include contact information of the proposer/s, a title, a proposal of 1,000 words, with an abstract of not more than 150 words for each individual paper, sent to spirasa@gmail.com.
For questions about the conference and this call for papers, please contact Pieter de Villiers at pgdevilliers@mweb.co.za.

5/29-6/2

New Testament Scholarship in the Nordic Countries: New Trends And Tasks

Nordic
New Testament Conference at Aarhus University, Denmark. The conference assembles
New Testament scholars from Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden
together with international guests.

Early Jewish Writings in Context: Gendered Perspectives Organizers: Marie-Theres Wacker (University of Muenster, Germany) and Eileen Schuller (Hamilton, Canada)
Jewish Writings from Hellenistic-Roman times that did not become part of the Jewish Canon have sometimes been undervalued as books “at the margins” of the Bible or overestimated as literature revealing dangerous secrets about the origins of Christianity. De facto, these writings came into being “in the context” of an already growing corpus of normative (biblical) literature and can be considered as an early form of biblical reception. On the other hand, motifs, traditions and concepts from these writings “besides the Bible” found their reception in Judaism, Christianity and also in Islam. This is true especially with regard to images of women and men and more generally for concepts of gender and gender relations, hot topics for ancient and contemporary religious communities as well as for secular societies. The international research colloquium “Early Jewish Writings in Context” places itself at the cutting edge of literary analysis (including historical perspectives) and reception history with a gender specific focus on both.
Papers will be given by Magdalena Díaz Araujo (Argentina), Veronika Backmann (Germany), Maxine Grossman (United States), Tal Ilan (Germany), Moisés Mayordomo (Switzerland), Adele Reinartz (Canada), Barbara Schmitz (Germany), Ruth Scoralick (Germany)Angela Standhartinger (Germany), Joan Taylor (England), Hanna Tervanotko (Finland), Marie-Theres Wacker (Germany).
The colloquium promotes young academics: interested doctoral students are welcome; it will be part of the interdisciplinary master program “Ancient Cultures of the Eastern Mediterranean” at WWU Muenster.
The contributions will be published as a volume edited by Marie-Theres Wacker and Eileen Schuller in the project The Bible and Women: An Encyclopedia of Exegesis and Cultural HistoryMore information

6/21-6/26

Eighth Enoch Seminar: Apocalypticism and Mysticism

The Eighth Enoch Seminar will convene at the Villa Cagnola in Gazzada, Italy (near Milan), from 21 to 26 June, 2015. The meeting is organised by Daniel Boyarin (Berkeley, USA), Lorenzo DiTommaso (Montreal, Canada), and Elliot Wolfson (Santa Barbara, USA), under the guidance of the Founding Director of the Enoch Seminar Gabriele Boccaccini (Michigan, USA).
The Seminar topic is apocalypticism and mysticism, their natures and relationship, in Judaism and Christianity from the Second Temple period through the late antique and early mediaeval centuries. The aim is to discuss the main issues in light of new evidence, methodologies, and approaches, oriented by a desire to advance the discussion along a broad front. While we do not expect to address every issue or answer every question, we do anticipate that the published results of our Seminar will stand as a foundational study for future research.
As participation is by invitation only, we invite all interested specialists to contact the Seminar secretary, Jason Zurawski as soon as possible, at the latest by 1 December 2014. Those interested in presenting a short paper should include a proposal containing a paper title and brief abstract. Plenary and short papers circulate in advance and are not read in the sessions, which are devoted primarily to discussion. Additional information will be posted on the Enoch Seminar and 4 Enoch websites over the course of the year.

6/29-6/30

International Symposium Digging up Jericho: Past, Present & Future
Jericho is an iconic site with a long and impressive history stretching from the Epipalaeolithic to the present day. Once dubbed the ‘Oldest City in the World’, it has been the focus of intense archaeological activity and media interest in the 150 years since its discovery. From the 1950s, when Kathleen Kenyon’s work at the site drew attention for its rigorous application of archaeological method, to the more recent Italian-Palestinian Expedition and the Kirbat al-Mafjar Archaeological Project, Jericho and its surrounding landscape has always played a key role in our understanding of this fascinating region. These diverse threads of the heritage, archaeology and history of the Jericho Oasis will be drawn together in a two-day symposium, hosted jointly by the Council for the British Research in the Levant, the Institute of Archaeology UCL, and the Non-Professional Archaeological Photographs-project. Sessions will be held on the general themes of Historical Perspectives, Current Fieldwork, Specialized Studies and Cultural Heritage, with a series of internationally speakers exploring the significance and legacy of this influential site.
Venue: Institute of Archaeology (University College London), 31-34 Gordon Square, London, UKWC1H 0PY United Kingdom
More information

July 2015

7/5-7/7

BAJS 2015: Atheism, Scepticism, and Challenges to Monotheism
This conference is hosted by the British Association for Jewish Studies, in cooperation with the Centre for Jewish Studies and the School of Arts, Languages and Cultures at the University of Manchester, and with the Institut für Jüdische Philosophie und Religion, Universität Hamburg.

Jews from across a wide spectrum of perspectives have wrestled with the questions posed by atheism and scepticism down through the centuries. Since, arguably, atheism is not recognised in the Hebrew Bible, the related theme of ‘challenges to Jewish monotheism’ is suggested with regard to the ancient world. Philosophical scepticism and atheism (in both theory and practice) raise questions for Jews about the nature of authority, modes of enquiry and textual analysis, intellectual exchange with non-Jewish culture (including polemics), and shifting conceptions of heresy, nonconformity, and irreligion. What is the relationship in the Jewish imagination between atheism and scepticism? What are the limits of scepticism in rabbinic thought and methodology? What does it mean to be an atheistic Jew? How have Jews engaged with historical-critical and scientific discourse? There have been many different Jewish responses to such questions, ranging from stout defences of monotheistic Judaism, to radical reformulations of Jewish religion, to theological resignation and apostasy, to the establishment of alternative universalist systems of thought by ostensibly non-Jewish Jews. These responses, which include the varieties of Jewish religion but also non-religious ways of being Jewish, appear in many different forms including philosophical, theological, sociological, psychological, legal, mystical, and literary genres.

Call for panels: XXI World Congress of the International Association for the History of Religions
We invite contributions from all disciplines of religious studies and related fields of research to allow for broad, interdisciplinary discussion of the Congress topic to register their panels for the XXI World Congress of the IAHR. Panels should address one of the four thematic Congress areas: Religious communities in society: Adaptation and transformation; Practices and discourses: Innovation and tradition; The individual: Religiosity, spiritualities and individualization; or Methodology: Representations and interpretations.
Deadlines will be announced on the website:More information

September 2015

9/11-9/13

Oceania Biblical Studies Association Conference
will be held at Piula Theological
College, Upolu, Samoa, in
the beautiful South Pacific.
Email the Secretary for OBSA:
Nasili
Vaka’uta
for more
information.

October 2015

10/7-10/8

New Creation Colloquium
Cornerstone University, Grand Rapids MI
Biblical scholars, theologians, church historians, philosophers and literary scholars are invited to submit proposals for papers to be presented at a colloquium on the theme of “New Creation.” Papers may deal with any aspect of the Christian eschatological doctrine of the redemption of all things. This includes discussion of key Old and New Testament texts and contexts, individuals or movements within Christian history that have articulated the doctrine, literary texts which bear on the issue, the ethical and social consequences of the doctrine, and the connection between this belief and Christian spirituality, liturgy and pastoral care. Contact Martin Spence, 616-949-5300 or martin.spence@cornerstone.edu

Philosophical Investigation of the Hebrew Scriptures, Talmud and Midrash,
The conference will take place in Jerusalem and will explore "The Questions of God’s Perfection." The conference will explore whether understanding God as perfect being is appropriate as a basis for Jewish theology and for religious belief more generally, bringing together perspectives on this question from philosophers, theologians,scholars of Bible and scholars of rabbinic literature. Invited participants will be Oliver Crisp, James Diamond, Jerome Gellman, Lenn E. Goodman, Moshe Halbertal, Yoram Hazony, Brian Leftow, Berel Dov Lerner Alan Mittleman, David Shatz, Eleonore Stump, Alan Torrance, Shmuel Trigano, and Howard Wettstein.
Scholars wishing to present papers at the conference should submit abstracts of 500-1,000 words together with a current CV to meiravj@herzlinstitute.orgCall for Papers

International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament (IOSOT) For the first time in its more than 50-years history the IOSOT will convene on African soil in 2016. The triennial meeting will take place at the University of Stellenbosch, Western Cape, South Africa. Updates and more information will be posted on the official website. Register there with your e-mail address to receive automatic updates and the Call for Papers. Questions contact: Prof Louis Jonker